February 2016 VFACTS new vehicle sales

The Australian new vehicle market underwent strong growth in February this year over the same (albeit one-day shorter) month in 2015 with 96,443 registrations recorded, up 6.7 per cent.

The VFACTS figures released this morning by the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries show that last month was Australia’s highest February on record. It also takes cumulative annual growth to almost 5 per cent over last year’s record.

This was driven by big growth in Australia’s most populated state, New South Wales, which grew 12.6 per cent to 32,633. Victoria (26,782, up 8.2 per cent) and Queensland (18,711, up 2.7 per cent) also saw good growth. Western Australia again weakened.

Of the 96,443 vehicles sold in February, 41 per cent were passenger cars (down 4.1 share points), 38.2 per cent were SUVs (up 2.8), and 18.1 per cent were light commercials (up 1.0). The tipping point to where SUVs become the new default draws ever closer.

Volume growth for SUVs and light commercials was 15.1 per cent and 12.8 per cent respectively, with Medium SUVs and 4×4 utes doing the bulk of the driving.

Toyota was, as always, the top selling brand in February 2016 with 16.8 per cent of the market and 16,191 sales. But the star was number one full importer Mazda, up 12.7 per cent to 10,205 units and 10.6 per cent share.

Next were Hyundai (7701, down 3.8 per cent), Holden (7340, down 6 per cent), Mitsubishi (6681, up 7 per cent), Ford (6656, up a strong 32.5 per cent), Nissan (5989, up 0.1 per cent), Volkswagen (4922, up 0.7 per cent), Subaru (3538, up 9.8 per cent) and Honda (3279, up 13 per cent).

The tier two brands outside the top ten were Mercedes-Benz (3236, up 17.9 per cent), Kia (3067, up 21.4 per cent), BMW (2748, up a massive 51.7 per cent), Audi (2007, up 18.1 per cent) and Isuzu Ute (1719, up 15.4 per cent).

Smaller brands that won for the month (alphabetically) were: Citroen (106, up 32.5 per cent), Ferrari (19, up 35.7 per cent), Fiat Professional vans (120, up 66.7 per cent), Jaguar (242, up 191.6 per cent), Lamborghini (9, up 50 per cent) and Land Rover/Range Rover (1374, up 64.2 per cent).

Others included: LDV (131, up 274 per cent), Lexus (816, up 29.5 per cent), Mini (310, up 34.2 per cent), Porsche (536, up a huge 144.7 per cent), Rolls-Royce (4, up 300 per cent), Suzuki (1674, up 12.3 per cent) and Volvo Car (478, up 59.3 per cent).

Losers for February included: Alfa Romeo (85, down 53.1 per cent), Aston Martin (9, down 40 per cent), Chrysler (51, down 34.6 per cent), Dodge (56, down 44.6 per cent), Fiat (254, down 35.7 per cent), Jeep (1378, down 42.1 per cent), Peugeot (338, down 16.5 per cent), Proton (23, down 17.9 per cent), Renault (654, down 12.7 per cent) and SsangYong (59, down 39.8 per cent).

Top models in February 2016

The Toyota Corolla was (not atypically) the most popular vehicle in February with 3455 sales, albeit down 12.3 per cent, ahead of the Mazda 3 (3354, down 6.8 per cent). This means the top two were from the Small Car segment, despite its 4.9 per cent decline.

The Toyota HiLux (3261, up 14 per cent) and Ford Ranger (2655, up 35.9 per cent) utes filled the next two spots, ahead of the always strong Hyundai i30 (2461, up 15.8 per cent).

Rounding out the top ten were the Holden Commodore (2331, down 7.4 per cent), Mitsubishi Triton (2165, up 8.9 per cent), Mazda CX-5 (2156, up 3.4 per cent), Hyundai Tucson (1849) and Volkswagen Golf (1752, down 0.7 per cent).

Private (up 1.1 per cent), business (up 15.6 per cent) and government (1.9 per cent) sales all grew in February, with only rentals (down 0.6 per cent) going the other way.

Australia’s biggest sources of imports were Japan (28,138), Thailand (22,325), Korea (9699, up 4.9 per cent), Korea (11,576) and Germany (7322), all of which accounted for more sales than Australian-made (6493).